Sara Crewe: or, What happened at Miss Minchin's boarding school by Frances Hodgson Burnett
page 38 of 62 (61%)
page 38 of 62 (61%)
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"A fire that I only thought I saw surely wouldn't feel warm," she said.
"It feels real--real." She went to it and knelt before it. She touched the chair, the table; she lifted the cover of one of the dishes. There was something hot and savory in it--something delicious. The tea-pot had tea in it, ready for the boiling water from the little kettle; one plate had toast on it, another, muffins. "It is real," said Sara. "The fire is real enough to warm me; I can sit in the chair; the things are real enough to eat." It was like a fairy story come true--it was heavenly. She went to the bed and touched the blankets and the wrap. They were real too. She opened one book, and on the title-page was written in a strange hand, "The little girl in the attic." Suddenly--was it a strange thing for her to do?--Sara put her face down on the queer, foreign looking quilted robe and burst into tears. "I don't know who it is," she said, "but somebody cares about me a little--somebody is my friend." Somehow that thought warmed her more than the fire. She had never had a friend since those happy, luxurious days when she had had everything; and those days had seemed such a long way off--so far away as to be only like dreams--during these last years at Miss Minchin's. She really cried more at this strange thought of having a friend--even though an unknown one--than she had cried over many of her worst |
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